Historian Reflects On War and Valor And a Son's Death

[question everything]

The Wall Street Journal

Historian Reflects On War and Valor And a Son's Death
Andrew Bacevich Opposed Iraq Conflict but, in Grief, He Still Believes in Serving
By GREG JAFFE
May 26, 2007; Page A1

WALPOLE, Mass. -- In late 2004, with the Iraq war raging, Andrew Bacevich's son told him that he was joining the Army. Mr. Bacevich's son didn't fit the profile of a typical soldier. First Lt. Andrew Bacevich spent his teenage years in affluent Boston and Washington, D.C., suburbs. His father was a professor at Boston University and a prominent conservative critic of the war, writing in some of the country's largest newspapers that the pre-emptive conflict was immoral, unnecessary and almost certain to lead to defeat.

But the father was also a retired colonel and Vietnam veteran. He had argued that it was essential that the children of America's lawmakers, professors, journalists and lawyers serve in the defense of the nation. Too often, the affluent and well-educated treat national defense as a job they can contract out to the same people who bused their tables and mowed their lawns, he wrote in his 2005 book "The New American Militarism." That made it too easy for the president to take the nation to war in the first place, and left too few people willing to hold the commander in chief accountable when things went awry, he warned. So the elder Mr. Bacevich didn't discourage his son from becoming an Army officer. Rather, he helped him. On May 13, Lt. Bacevich, age 27, was killed by a suicide bomber near Balad, a small Sunni town north of Baghdad.

(snip)

In October 2006, Andy was sent to Iraq as a platoon leader responsible for the lives of 15 soldiers. Around that time, Mr. Bacevich pondered the value of life in Iraq. An Iraqi civilian killed mistakenly by U.S. forces merits a payment from the Pentagon of just $2,500 to his or her family, he wrote in the Washington Post. The family of a U.S. soldier killed in action typically receives about $400,000, he noted. "In launching a war advertised as a high-minded expression of U.S. idealism, we have wandered into a swamp of moral ambiguity," he wrote. He never mentioned his son in his writings and asked reporters quoting him in stories not to write about his son, either. "I didn't want to burden him with my political baggage. My son had an enormous responsibility and a tremendously difficult job," he says. When his son called home from Iraq, he often sounded exhausted, Mr. Bacevich says. In February, he spent a two-week leave with his family. He seemed physically drained.


(snip)

On Tuesday, Mr. Bacevich was sitting on his back porch when the Army casualty assistance officer assigned to help his family handed him a survivor's benefit check for $100,000. For a widow with children, such checks are a lifesaver. But Mr. Bacevich doesn't need the money. "I felt sick to my stomach," he says. "The inadequacy of it just strikes you." As a historian and former soldier, he takes clear-cut lessons from the check, his son's death and the broader war. "When you use force, the unintended consequences that result are so large and the surprises so enormous that it really reaffirms the ancient wisdom to which we once adhered -- namely, to see force as something to be used only as a last resort." In the future, he says, historians will wonder how a country such as the U.S. ever came to see military force as "such a flexible, efficient, cost-effective and supposedly useful instrument."

For a father, the lessons are far less clear-cut. When he was writing against the war, which was often, he told himself he was doing the best he could to end the conflict. Should he have told his son not to volunteer for such a war? "I believe in service to country. I believe soldiering is an honorable profession. There is no clear right and wrong here," he says. "What I tried to do was inadequate."


URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118013715744415303.html (subscription)

[dave_p]

1. Limits of force

In the future, he says, historians will wonder how a country such as the U.S. ever came to see military force as "such a flexible, efficient, cost-effective and supposedly useful instrument"

Wise words. Iraq shows once again what you can and can't do with the US military. It isn't the panacea for obstinate overseas woes. Other countries learned that the hard way, that's why they don't maintain such massive forces for inappropriate and impractical purposes.

[ulysses]

2. honorable man.

I hope he and his family find peace.

[Vexatious Ape]

3. I read his book, "The New American Militarism".

It was very sad to hear that he lost his son in Iraq. My thoughts are with him and his family.

[question everything]

4. self kick